"cenci11" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dumas Alexandre)

His brutality then knew no bounds. He forced Lucrezia and Beatrice
to share the same bed, threatening his wife to kill her if she
disclosed to his daughter by a single word that there was anything
odious in such an intercourse. So matters went on for about three
years.

At this time Francesco was obliged to make a journey, and leave the
women alone and free. The first thing Lucrezia did was to enlighten
Beatrice an the infamy of the life they were leading; they then
together prepared a memorial to the pope, in which they laid before
him a statement of all the blows and outrages they had suffered.
But, before leaving, Francesco Cenci had taken precautions; every
person about the pope was in his pay, or hoped to be. The petition
never reached His Holiness, and the two poor women, remembering that
Clement VIII had on a farmer occasion driven Giacomo, Cristaforo, and
Rocco from his presence, thought they were included in the same
proscription, and looked upon themselves as abandoned to their fate.

When matters were in this state, Giacomo, taking advantage of his
father's absence, came to pay them a visit with a friend of his, an
abbe named Guerra: he was a young man of twenty-five or twenty-six,
belonging to one of the most noble families in Rome, of a bold,
resolute, and courageous character, and idolised by all the Roman
ladies for his beauty. To classical features he added blue eyes
swimming in poetic sentiment; his hair was long and fair, with
chestnut beard and eyebrows; add to these attractions a highly
educated mind, natural eloquence expressed by a musical and
penetrating voice, and the reader may form some idea of Monsignor the
Abbe Guerra.

No sooner had he seen Beatrice than he fell in love with her. On her
side, she was not slow to return the sympathy of the young priest.
The Council of Trent had not been held at that time, consequently
ecclesiastics were not precluded from marriage. It was therefore
decided that on the return of Francesco the Abbe Guerra should demand
the hand of Beatrice from her father, and the women, happy in the
absence of their master, continued to live on, hoping for better
things to come.

After three or four months, during which no one knew where he was,
Francesco returned. The very first night, he wished to resume his
intercourse with Beatrice; but she was no longer the same person, the
timid and submissive child had become a girl of decided will; strong
in her love for the abbe, she resisted alike prayers, threats, and
blows.

The wrath of Francesco fell upon his wife, whom he accused of
betraying him; he gave her a violent thrashing. Lucrezia Petroni was
a veritable Roman she-wolf, passionate alike in love and vengeance;
she endured all, but pardoned nothing.